Even if you’re not back in the classroom, autumn inspires a desire to learn, to restore the intellectualism that was fried by too many beers and barbecues and sunburns. Fortunately, Portland is full this fall with opportunities to spark your smarts. Here are some of our favorites.

Margaret Atwood | September 21
How better to bid farewell to a utopian summer (and to commemorate the birthday of Stephen King and HG Wells) than to dissect dystopian fiction — and the realities that foster it — with Canadian visionary (and feminist hero) Margaret Atwood? Her most recent novel, THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD (Anchor), which came out in 2009, is now out in paperback; it’s a scary satire that deals with climate change, eco-evangelists, materialism, and human nature. She’ll talk about that and more at the Writers on a New England Stage series co-sponsored by RiverRun Bookstore in New Hampshire.
7:30 pm at The Music Hall | 28 Chestnut St, Portsmouth, NH | $11-13 | 603.436.2400 | themusichall.org

Lizz Winstead | September 25This isn’t technically a reading, but funny lady Lizz Winstead (a co-creator and former head writer of The Daily Show and a co-founder of Air America Radio, where she used to co-host with Rachel Maddow) has a way with words. These days, she’s working on WAKE UP WORLD with the Shoot the Messenger troupe, a sketch-comedy skewering of bland morning “news” shows. She’ll be a one-woman show when she stops in Portland, but the jabs will be just as sharp.
8 pm at One Longfellow Square | 181 State St, Portland | $20 | 207.761.1757 | onelongfellowsquare.com

Lily King | September 29Maine author Lily King’s third book, FATHER OF THE RAIN, garnered high praise in a July 22 New York Times book review: “King is a beautiful writer, with equally strong gifts for dialogue and internal monologue,” Liesl Schillinger wrote. “Silently or aloud, her characters betray the inner tumult they conceal as they try to keep themselves together, wanting others to see them as whole.” Find out how King honed her craft over lunch at the Portland Public Library’s Brown Bag Lecture series.
Noon at the Rines Auditorium in the Portland Public Library | 5 Monument Square, Portland | Free | 207.871.1700 | portlandlibrary.org

Finding her voice "There is a balm in Gilead," an old African-American spiritual has it, and sure enough, Percy Talbott (Kelly Caufield) finds that balm.

Now playing — RISD: The Musical! We all know RISD students like to paint and draw, but can they hoof it? Or belt out a show tune and carry a giant pencil at the same time? Well, yes, it turns out.

Moral surgery You know upon meeting Becky Shaw that you're in the presence of a smart, snappy writer. But you picture playwright Gina Gionfriddo as someone more akin to Theresa Rebeck than William Makepeace Thackeray.

Endgame As Billie Holiday fell apart, so did her fragile if expressive voice.

After images Karen Finley won’t be naked, or covered in chocolate. Candied yams will not be involved. If there are neighborhood morality-watch squads in Salem, they’ll have the night off.

Strange trips If you want this summer’s eerie subject matter to hit a bit closer to home, or a bit closer to reality, check out Strange Maine: True Tales from the Pine Tree State , by Michelle Souliere (The History Press; $17.99).

Review: Per Petterson plumbs The River of Time Why would Per Petterson — the bestselling Scandinavian writer whose books don't feature an invincible crimefighting heroine — curse the river of time when he is so adept at navigating it?

Review: Mixed Magic's Art of Attack Both the first and the last line we hear in Art of Attack , by Asa Merritt, is: "You must take your opponent into a deep, dark forest where two and two are five and the way out is only wide enough for one."

ALL THE WORLD'S A STAGE | July 24, 2014 When three theater companies, all within a one-hour drive of Portland, choose to present the same Shakespeare play on overlapping dates, you have to wonder what about that particular show resonates with this particular moment.

CHECKING IN: THE NEW GUARD AND THE WRITER'S HOTEL | July 11, 2014 Former Mainer Shanna McNair started The New Guard, an independent, multi-genre literary review, in order to exalt the writer, no matter if that writer was well-established or just starting out.

NO TAR SANDS | July 10, 2014 “People’s feelings are clear...they don’t want to be known as the tar sands capitol of the United States."